God in a Bar

 It was an unusual weekend. Saturday afternoon, we threw a suitcase into the car and drove down to Tybee Island, Georgia. Tybee is a fascinating place that I’m just getting to know. Most people who know Tybee know it because of the beach. They like to go and soak up some sun, play in the surf and get covered with sand. I’m not one for big crowds, so the beach is not the fascinating part for me.

Before you get to the beach, if you’re observant, you’ll find a different culture. I’m not talking about the tourists and beach-goers. I’m talking about the regulars – residents and people who frequent Tybee more than any other place. There are places on Tybee Island that one can go and experience an atmosphere that is totally unique. Most of it is good. It’s a very informal place. If you show up in a jacket and tie, you’ll probably be pegged as a politician and summarily dismissed. Tybee people have more important things to do than listen to politicians give speeches, make promises and generally clutter up the place.

So the gang that made up the best part of our college experience came together for a short time of remembering and making new memories. Micheal grilled steaks outside; Dee handled things inside the kitchen while the rest of us helped here and there and kept up a running commentary on life. 

As part of our extravaganza, we headed out to church on Sunday morning. That’s nothing new for us. What was new was the location. We headed out to Tybrisa Street to a little place called the Wind Rose Café. The term “café” is used a bit loosely. Basically, the Wind Rose Café is a bar that serves food. The specials are written in dry erase marker on a board near the door as you enter. The rest of the décor consists of various signs and posters for Budweiser and other adult beverages. The brownish ceiling tiles were each decorated and autographed by a different person. There were drawings, designs and slogans depending upon the inclination of the artist. You could spend a long time just perusing the ceiling art.

As I looked around, I could see that the tables had been set up facing the small stage at the end of the room. Ash trays were scattered around the place. Votive candles had been set up at the tables and at each place along the bar. We were stationed near the entrance, standing in the back, due to the practically non-existent ventilation system of the Wind Rose. Some folks looked rougher than others. There was one woman who apparently had taken a fall recently or had some kind of altercation as shown by the marks on her face. A woman with a stroller came in. Pirates and paupers, beach bums and bohemians mingled together. It hit me then that this was the kind of place one would look for Jesus when he walked around down here.

Then the service began. A long-haired man on the small stage began playing a keyboard and singing. He was joined by a young woman providing supporting vocals and a drummer who was hidden at the very back of the stage. Suddenly, the most beautiful harmonica sound I had ever heard caught my ear. Looking around, I saw a man in a black jacket seated at the bar. He was playing harmonica into a microphone and moving in time with the music. “Lead us into worship, Gordo!” called the keyboard player to the harmonica maestro. 

For the next hour, I soaked in this worship of the common folk and I came to this conclusion: When you get rid of the suits and ties, the formal orders of worship, the church-y language, and the expectations of how church “ought to be done,” it makes a lot more room for God. People smiled and laughed out loud. They hugged one another. They were relaxed with one another and with the possibility that God might show up. It was a liberating way to worship. 

I wonder, sometimes, if we’ve gotten so caught up in the form of worship that we’ve lost the essence of worship. Sometimes the only goal of services in the big, formal edifices that many of us attend is to follow the accepted forms as closely as possible and not allow for any surprises. That’s not the stated goal, of course, but it’s there just the same. It’s the only goal that some of them reach. I couldn’t help but wonder about the people I know who are part of the suit-and-tie brigade. Would any of them be comfortable worshipping along with these jeans and t-shirt clad islanders? Would they even consider doing so? I hope so.

If they did, they might see God and the people having a grand time together. In a bar.

Jesus smiled.

Deserts and Graveyards

One of my favorite Creedence Clearwater Revival songs says it all. In the song Fortunate Son, John Fogarty’s unmistakable voice wails, “When we ask them ‘How much should we give,’ they only answer ‘more, more, more.’” Seems like everyone wants more, and they want it from me. I get all kinds of phone calls and mailings and other appeals for support for all kinds of things.

A lot of these things are good, worthy causes and deserve to be supported. I wish I could give to all of those. Many of these things are shady or political in nature or are at least trying to sell me something I don’t need or want.  I’d like to banish the shameless perpetrators of these hoaxes and false appeals to outer darkness – or at least to someplace where the only people they have to talk to is each other.

Everyone wants more from me when I have less to give. I wish money was all they wanted. The hardest appeals are the ones that ask me for time, personal investment, emotional commitment and ultimately a piece of my soul. 

Don’t get me wrong. I’ve made many personal commitments and I’m glad that I made most of them. Still, even the commitments that you’re grateful for take something away from you. It requires a reservoir of personal energy, love and faith to answer them. Some days you feel like the reservoir is in serious danger of running dry without a raincloud in the sky to replenish it.

Someone is saying, right about now, “Come on, Mitch - you’ve got to have faith. You’ve got to believe that things are going to be OK.” Well, I get that. It doesn’t change the fact that some days are dry as a desert and silent as a graveyard. Some of my friends of faith would say that being in the metaphorical desert or graveyard means that I’ve lost my focus on God or that I’ve allowed my priorities to shift from where they should be. Some would say that if I remained totally focused on God and aligned with divine priorities, there would be no sand and silence.

I’m not a perfect person. There are times that I have indeed allowed priorities to get skewed or have lost some degree of focus. You don’t live as long as I have and not have that happen. Still, I have to say to those friends of the faith who would scold me because of these feelings of emptiness: “I love you – now get outta my face!”

 

I mean really – it’s part of the human condition to sometimes feel mentally, emotionally and spiritually drained or exhausted. At least it’s part of my human condition. I’ll admit to being somewhat moody or even prone to some degree of depression. There are probably multiple causes of this particular state of being. There may be multiple ways to move through it. Do not, however, give me simple pietistic platitudes and expect me to immediately experience some Damascus Road event or, Lord help me, “snap out of it.” The only people who “snap out of it” are the people who never really were dealing with the issue to begin with. For the rest of us, snapping out of it is not an option.

The only way to get out of the desert is to walk through it. The only way out of the graveyard is to experience a rebirth. Neither happens quickly, as far as I can tell. It takes a strong degree of patience, personal will, love and yes, faith, to make it to happen. For those who are on the outside of the process, thank you for your love and concern. Please, however, don’t think you understand where I am or where anyone is who might be dealing with the empty silence. Perhaps you have been through the desert – but not my desert. You may have wandered in the graveyard, but the markers and monuments you’ve seen are not the ones I read and contemplate. When I reach the boundaries of the wasteland, I’ll know it and I’ll be glad that you’re there waiting for me. In the meantime, please allow me (and anyone else who may need it) the time to make the journey through.

We might even be better people when we reach the other side.

When I Grow Up

I took a brief hiatus from writing during the holidays. No one noticed, but that's OK. I figured that you were on hiatus too. At any rate, all the Christmas hoopla, New Year's hoopla and just general hoopla gave me the chance to think about some things – always a dangerous process. I spent some time thinking about what it's like to be a kid. Parenthetically, I know that some folks out there hate the term “kid” when it refers to human children. I once had a woman become indignant, telling me that they are NOT goats, they are children. Obviously she had never lived with human children or she wouldn't have made that statement.

When we're kids, we spend a lot of time talking and thinking about what and who we'll be when we grow up. When-I-Grow-Up-Land is a magical destination when you're very young. I's the place where you can be in charge of everything. You can have any job you want, wear what you want and if you want to eat ice cream for breakfast, no one will stop you.

Apparently, When-I-Grow-Up-Land doesn't exist. At least I haven't stumbled across it yet. I still have people who tell me what to do and when it should be done. I have to wear approved clothing because image is important. If I want ice cream, I have to go against the advice of nutritionists and health care professionals. What a drag!

As a child, there were a lot of different things I wanted to be. My father was a military man, so for a very short while, I thought that must be my destiny as well. I quickly realized that my personality wasn't suited to the style and mission of the military. I hate taking orders. I hate not being able to dress in jeans and t-shirts. I also hate the idea of killing or being killed or being told where to stand when it happens (thanks, Max Klinger, for that one).

For a while I had a real interest in science. Maybe being a scientist was my future! Before long, I found that a severe lack of mathematical skills was an impassible barrier for my scientific ambitions. I still love science, particularly the study of outer space and the universe, but other than watching the Discovery Channel, I'm not really active in that milieu.

My interest in music began when I was in junior high school. I took up the acoustic guitar and dreamed of playing in a band. As I grew, I found that there were (and still are) a huge number of people who are much better musicians than I. I still enjoy playing, but the truth is that you'll never hear me playing an acoustic set at your local coffee house unless one of us has lost a bet.

In college, I discovered an interest in and modest talent for writing. No hit songs or great novels have materialized, regardless of my supposed talent. I did use my journalism training in writing a number of items for the community columnist feature of the local newspaper, which is fun and makes you feel like you're important. I'm not a bad writer. I'm just not a great one. There are a lot of those around and not a lot of room for more. It may be that my local newspaper rants and this blog will be the best creative writing I will ever do. If so, then that's the way it is. Like music, writing can be valuable simply because it is enjoyable and allows me to express myself even if no one is listening or reading.

The question facing me now is this: What do I want to be when I grow up? I still don't know. There is another question that I have to answer first. The question is: Do I want to grow up? After all, it's more fun trying new things than being tied down to old ones that leave you no room for exploration and discovery.

For now, there will have to have to be a vacancy in When-I-Grow-Up-Land. I'm still deciding who I am.

Scars

Last week was not one of our easiest. My wife spent 3 ½ days in the hospital after undergoing abdominal surgery. She’s home and on the road to recovery and things look good. Meantime, I’m here to tell you that it’s impossible to get any rest in the hospital. Between nurses checking vital signs, bringing medication and just checking up on you, food service employees carrying trays of something they call “food,” and the basic discomfort that comes with having surgery, sleep is a precious and ephemeral thing. We pursue it, but never quite capture it. I know this because I, too, spent three nights in the hospital, sleeping on the recliner beside Linda's bed.

During our time as clients of our local health care facility, I became a ghost. That is, I had the opportunity to move through the halls of the hospital regularly enough that I became part of the landscape. No one paid any attention to me as I went for coffee or visited the vending machines or the dining room for carry-out swill. It made for an interesting opportunity for observation.

As I looked at all the people who drifted through the halls and rooms of the hospital, I began to wonder about their stories. No one was here because they wanted to be. I could see on the faces of people in the waiting areas that they were tired and worried and perhaps fearful of whatever news they might receive. Some looked anxious, some looked resigned, and some looked like they didn’t know what they should be feeling. They were just numb.

Pain is the great equalizer. No matter who we are, when we are sick or injured we’re suddenly on the same plane with everyone else. Whatever it is that hurts, it hurts the same if we’re the CEO or the janitor. The same is true for those who are in the waiting rooms and sitting at bedsides. We all have pain. We all have scars. Some are physical. Many are emotional and spiritual.

Most of the time, we don’t want to allow our scars to show. We’re not as shy about the physical scars. In the immortal film “The Replacements,” the mortal Keanu Reeves once said: “Pain fades, chicks dig scars, glory lasts forever.” Physical scars can sometimes become strange badges of honor. The scars on our psyche and our soul are somehow different. They are much more intimate and it hurts to reveal them or even discuss them. We often prefer to keep them covered and in the dark, where it’s harder to heal and where we can look at them when we’re alone.

Have you ever had someone bump you or give you a playful slap and hit a sore place or half-healed wound they didn’t know was there? Until they hear our shout of pain or see our contorted face, they had no idea that we had been hurt. The same is true for our souls. We nurse old wounds and injuries, holding them close. Then someone unintentionally lands a blow directly on that partially healed, still inflamed spot and we experience the pain anew as if it were the first time. If only they had known, they would have touched us differently.

I wish we were able to be more open about our need to heal. Allowing those we love and trust to see the wounds that we carry around inside might actually facilitate our becoming whole again. Becoming vulnerable is the first step toward being fully healed. I’ve never been able to do that. It’s a character flaw, I guess. Sometimes I treat my pain as if it were a precious possession: “It’s mine,” says some personal demon, “and I refuse to share it with anyone else. If I do that, I’ll appear weak. I’ll loose control of my situation.” As if I was ever strong. As if I ever had control.

Once and for all, here’s the truth: We all hurt. We’ve all been wounded and we all carry the scars of personal failure, of being caught in circumstances we can’t control and of being betrayed by someone we trusted. It’s time we all admitted that and allowed someone else to see it. Yes, that will cause pain as well, but it will be the pain of necessary medicine, not the pain of silent suffering. 

Can we do it? Probably. Let's hope so. Can I do it? Possibly. I hope so. We’ll see.

Molly

It’s Thanksgiving week. Mostly that’s a good thing. I enjoy the time away from the office spent with family. I really enjoy Thanksgiving dinner with turkey, dressing, green bean casserole and pumpkin pie and then, later, turkey sandwiches. What’s not to love about that?

It’s not all good feelings and good times, though. This week we noted the 2^nd anniversary of a sad event in our lives. Two years ago, we lost our dog, Molly. Molly was a beautiful border collie/Labrador mix with deep, expressive brown eyes that gave you a glimpse of the wonderful heart inside. She was what our vet calls a "dumpster dog." That is, she was unwanted and abandoned as a small puppy. We met her, fell in love and adopted her into our family. Molly was 13 years old when she died and had suffered with Addison’s disease for about 10 years. She almost died at least three times before that day in 2008.

Over the years, we spent more money than I want to tally in veterinarian bills and medication. Life with Molly was sometimes difficult. There was the time that we had to force feed her with a syringe because she couldn’t eat. I remember having to give her special baths for a skin condition that cropped up a month or so after we adopted her.

Then there was the time she had to wear one of those lampshades for dogs that keep them from aggravating some injury. She didn’t know what to do with it. It was clear, so she couldn’t see it very well and continually bumped into walls and door frames, at which time she’d just stand there looking confused or look at us for an explanation. It was hard not to laugh. Then I made the mistake of giving her a piece of banana. It was done with the best of intentions. I felt sorry for her for having to wear the lampshade and look silly. And she really loved bananas. So I gave her a bite. Before she could swallow, Molly was suddenly seized with the need to sneeze. Violently. Bang! Banana lampshade!

For all the difficulties and occasional silliness, Molly was loving, intelligent and loyal. She was a friend. A best friend. She was always glad to see us. If a family member was absent, Molly always watched the door, knowing that things weren’t right unless we were all together. She loved walks until the Addison’s manifested. She loved to share your snacks and she loved her squeaky, spiky ball. She loved us. No matter how bad I felt about the day or about my life, Molly was there to tell me that things couldn’t be that bad if you have a dog that loves you.

She was right.

See you at the Rainbow Bridge, girl.

Introvert's Lament

I’ve been reading the blog of my dear friend, Micheal. He has the marvelous gift of telling stories about people and places that resonate with something inside each one of us. He’s also one of the most transparent people I know. That’s a gift that’s difficult to use. When we’re transparent, others are free to accept us, reject us or ignore us. It takes courage to be real.

I wish that I was able to be that way a lot more than I am. I have a difficult time allowing others to see what is going on inside my head and heart. That’s basically because I am, in Jungian terms, a true introvert. It’s what I am and, as Edie Brickell once sang, "What I am is what I am.” It’s not something that’s going to change, so I have to live with it. So do my friends and family and anyone else I encounter.

This introversion stuff causes frustration to some because, unless I know and trust you, I’m not likely to let you see all of who I am. Trust takes time and not everyone has time to give. Those who don’t have time for investment in folks like me just take what they see at face value and go on. That’s their right but I wonder what would happen if they gave me a little more time.

I’m not the only one with this particular personality gift. I say gift because I believe that we are each gifted to see the world and to relate to people in a certain way. What we and others choose to make of that gift is what makes the world what it is. Perhaps the world would be much better than it is if we actually encouraged people to be the best of who they really are instead of requiring them to be the best of what we think they should be.

I’ve seen good people become bitter or burned out because they weren’t allowed, either by their jobs or their families, to become fully the persons they were created to be. They lost faith in themselves, the world and God without ever having the chance to come to full faith in the first place. I hate that. I hate it for them and I hate it for the rest of us, who will never have the chance to know them as truly joyful people living their lives and gifts to the fullest.

Where are you and I in all this? What do we tend to do with the people who move into and out of lives?  I hope that we see the treasure they really are instead of projecting onto them the personality or set of values we think they should have. Unfortunately, that’s the state of American society these days. We’re the culture that says, “If you’re not like me, they you’re against me. You should want to do what I do, say what I say, look like I look and think what I think.” Today the norm is “Conform or be Cast Out.”

I guess we all conform to some extent, but we all have to decide where to draw the line. How far are we willing to go before we dig in and refuse to compromise who we are any further? Only you can decide where that is for you. Wherever it is, I wish you the courage to find that place and stand firm. You are who you are and that’s good enough.

Why am I using this blog to tell you all this? Because I’m am an introvert and having this type of conversation doesn’t always come easy. Conversely, it’s the conversation I need to have. Talk about being conflicted!

In the words of Rodney Dangerfield, “It ain’t easy being me.”

Thin Places and Holy Faces

I was talking with a friend the other day. She mentioned that it was time for her to seek some answers to some of the questions that life tends to throw at us and is planning to take a few days and go someplace where she’ll have the opportunity to think, to get in touch with herself and to see the world from a different perspective.

I get that. Whether or not we admit it to anyone, ourselves included, we all need to find some time and some space that will allow us to become reacquainted with ourselves all over again.  If we are fortunate, we become reacquainted with something more – something beyond ourselves. A few years ago (more or less) I was doing some reading on the spirituality of the Celtic people. It’s a fascinating study and I have so much more to learn. One wonderful concept that I encountered, though, is something called The Thin Place.

What in the world is The Thin Place? Sounds like a code name for Nutrisystem, but that’s not it. The Thin Place has been around for a very long time. Celtic Christians in the areas of Ireland, Scotland and Wales more than a thousand years ago expressed their faith in ways that are a bit unfamiliar to most of us. Unfamiliar they may be, still they call to a deep and abiding need inside many of us – the need for something more in our lives, something more than the kind of superficial spirituality and lukewarm commitment that often characterize what passes for faith today.

In the Celtic worldview, there were places where this world and the realm of the spiritual come close together. George McLeod said: “It is a thin place where only tissue paper separates the material from the spiritual.”  The Rev. Mel Schlacter of Trinity Episcopal Church in Iowa City does a good job of explaining the concept. He says this: “In Celtic thought, a so-called Thin Place was a transition zone: where earth meets sky on a mountaintop; where land meets ocean at the coast, or better yet on an island; where the wilderness meets domestic land as at the edge of a moor, or where things beneath the earth come to the surface at a holy well. Thin Places carried power. They were places of encounter with the Divine.” Sounds a lot like a Moses and the burning bush event!

I found a brief but beautiful account of a person’s seeking of a Thin Place by a woman named Mary Wolf. She says that “… it may be that there are some places, like some chords in music, that evoke something spiritual in people, as the smell of burning leaves can bring back childhood to many of us; and that some places have more of that power than others.”

Wolf goes on to say something particularly thought provoking. She says that maybe we can work on becoming ourselves the thinnest places we can manage to be. “Not in the sense of meagerness, as fashion models are thin…but thin in the sense of transparency; being as full as we can of the love of God and leaking it like crazy.” She likens it to having a highly permeable spiritual membrane.

The problem is that because of our own nature, we often take only a sip of the living water when we really want to gulp. We each have our areas of indifference or cruelty, being sometimes spiteful and self-serving. We don’t love the First Love nearly as often or as well as we should or as we would like.

Thin Places are places of calling. They offer us the gift of grace and become lodged deep in our inmost self. Being in the Thin Place, or being Thin Place People gives us a taste of what Love is supposed to be. After that, nothing is really the same ever again.

 

When is the last time we’ve been to a Thin Place? When is the last time we became one? Neither one just happens. We have to seek out the kind of thinness and transparency that allows us to encounter and then to exude the presence of God. When others look at us they see the presence of the Holy in our faces. That’s really what it’s all about when we put away all the bureaucratic structure and release our baggage of material constraints, emotional armor and self-centeredness.

 

One final quote from Schlacter: “Thin Places are the destinations of pilgrimage, and the journey can be just as well through the heart as over land and sea.”

After all is said and done, the Thin Place is where we need to go and who we need to be.